(Owsla/Atlantic)
The connoisseur’s EDM artist crams every production trick in the book on to his second full-length LP: guest-laden eclecticism that walks the line between catchy and annoying
It is nine years since Sonny Moore – AKA Skrillex – last released an album. His 2014 debut, Recess, opened with a track called All Is Fair in Love and Brostep – a knowing nod to the derogatory term for the dubstep-derived sound that made him famous. More importantly the track featured a guest appearance from the Ragga Twins, east London authors of the early 90s singles Spliffhead, Hooligan 69 and Wipe the Needle – much-prized examples of their fellow Hackney natives Shut Up and Dance’s idiosyncratic, copyright-busting approach to old-school hardcore rave. The combination of title and collaborators was clearly aimed at Skrillex’s detractors, who viewed him as the godfather of a subtlety-free, Las Vegas-friendly, confetti-cannon-heavy subgenre that finally broke dance music to a mainstream US audience and seemed to bear as much of a relationship to house music as hair metal did to the blues. It felt designed to send a message regarding his bona fides: Don’t confuse me with my cake-throwing, trumpet-playing EDM peers – I know more than you think I do.
In the near-decade since Recess’s release, said message seems to have been taken on board. Skrillex is unique among big EDM names. His services as a producer have been courted not only by mainstream stars – Justin Bieber and Ed Sheeran included – but by hip pop figures renowned for their epicurean tastes in collaborators, such as Beyoncé, the Weeknd, PinkPantheress and FKA twigs.
